In early computer systems, data-storage devices were either peripheral devices directly connected to computer systems or were internal components of the computer systems. Later, following the advent of computer networking, computer systems were provided the ability to access remote data-storage components through network communications. In general, these remote data-storage components are directly connected to remote computer systems, and access to the remote data-storage systems involves exchanging data with the remote computer systems to which they are attached. The remote computer systems essentially operate as data and file servers. Still more recently, independent, autonomous data-storage devices have been developed for direct access by client computers. These autonomous data-storage devices often store data redundantly, in order to provide fault tolerance, and may be implemented with redundant components in order to provide both hardware fault tolerance and high availability. One class of autonomous data-storage devices includes devices referred to as “network-attached storage devices” (“NAS devices”). NAS devices are generally implemented using relatively stripped-down operating systems to provide remotely-stored file systems for computer systems, referred to as “client computers,” that access the NAS devices via network communications. NAS devices may each provide one or more NAS objects, each NAS object representing, to an accessing client computer, the root directory of a file system. NAS devices may also implement data bases, code repositories, and many other types of networked-attached data-serving systems. NAS devices and NAS objects are relatively inexpensive, are relatively straightforwardly incorporated into networked computer environments, and provide flexible, easily augmented data storage for a networked computer environment. However, with the proliferation of NAS devices and NAS objects within many networked computer systems, configuration and management of NAS-object/client-computer connections has become a significant administrative overhead. For this reason, designers, manufacturers, vendors, and users of NAS devices and NAS objects, and of computer systems that access NAS devices and NAS objects, have recognized the need for a unified management and maintenance tool for networked computer environments that include NAS devices and NAS objects.